Bakhmut fire, 15 August 2026 Бахмутський район · Bakhmut
The fire started on 15 August 2026 in Bakhmut, Ukraine, and satellites saw it burning for 9 days. Copernicus mapped a burnt perimeter of 170 hectares from satellite imagery, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 525th largest in Donetsk Oblast since 2016 (of 1004 with a page). Number 542 in Ukraine in 2026, of 984.
The power measured by the satellite is low (6.2 MW in the strongest hotspot), more typical of grass or stubble burning, or a slow surface fire, than of a large crown fire.
Compare with…
- Burnt area
- 170ha
- Copernicus perimeter
- Duration
- 9days
- 15 Aug 2026 – 23 Aug 2026
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 15 Aug
- 2026
- Heat detections
- 2
- in a single hotspot: 6 MW
- Danger at start
- 20
- Moderate · FWI index
- Average daily power
- 8MW
- detected power per day, on average
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
15 Aug 2026 · 8 MW · 2
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
The weather it burned in
It had gone 16 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.
This area had burned before
62% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 105 ha in 2024, 5 ha in 2025.
What happened to each town
-
170 ha reached on 15 Aug0.1 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the official perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
What burned
- Other natural land49 %
- Agricultural areas40 %
- Mixed forest11 %
Land cover inside the perimeter as reported by Copernicus EFFIS (outside the Corine Land Cover area).
The weather day by day
ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)
| Day | High | Min. humidity | Peak gust | Rain | Danger (FWI) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15 Aug | 23.5 °C | 31 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 20 |
| 16 Aug | 27.4 °C | 32 % | 17 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 17 |
| 17 Aug | 30.0 °C | 29 % | 18 km/h | 0.0 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 18 Aug | 31.9 °C | 18 % | 27 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 28 |
| 19 Aug | 28.4 °C | 43 % | 42 km/h | 0.8 mm | Moderate 21 |
| 20 Aug | 26.6 °C | 32 % | 28 km/h | 0.6 mm | Moderate 19 |
| 21 Aug | 31.6 °C | 28 % | 30 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 25 |
| 22 Aug | 34.2 °C | 22 % | 28 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 30 |
| 23 Aug | 34.5 °C | 19 % | 31 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 24 Aug after | 26.6 °C | 27 % | 40 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 36 |
| 25 Aug after | 26.0 °C | 27 % | 32 km/h | 0.0 mm | High 32 |
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.
The smoke
CAMS · CopernicusOn 18 August 2026 the air beside the fire reached 27 µg/m³ of PM2.5. That day averaged 16: 1.1 times the WHO daily guideline (15).
Particles from the Copernicus CAMS model at the centre of the perimeter; these are not measurements in each town. The pale bar is the worst hour, the solid one the daily average.
Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS)
Detections table · 2Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Bakhmut fire last?
- According to the heat detections seen by satellite inside the perimeter, it burned from 15 August 2026 to 23 August 2026 (9 days). The perimeter dates it from 15 August 2026 to 15 August 2026.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter Copernicus measured from satellite imagery is 170 hectares (1.7 km²). Official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Bakhmut (170 ha, 0.1 %).
- Did the fire reach a town?
- The closest fire to a town centre came within 20.1 km of Bakhmut. That is the distance to the perimeter or nearest hotspot; it does not mean it entered the houses.
- What was the weather like?
- During the fire the temperature reached 23.5 °C, humidity dropped to 31 % and gusts hit 31 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 20, class Moderate.
- Where does this data come from?
- From the EFFIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Ukraine (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
Where to verify it
A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.
Emergency number: 101 · 112
Satellite cross-check
Does something look wrong on this page?
This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.
Report an error
How we know this
- Perimeter: EFFIS (Copernicus), mapped on satellite imagery.
- Dates adjusted with the VIIRS detections inside the perimeter, which said 15 August 2026 to 15 August 2026. 2 Suomi-NPP VIIRS detections on those dates.
- We have not matched this page with any official record.
- Weather: Copernicus ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, in cells of about 25 km.
Where this data comes from
The perimeter and land cover come from the Copernicus European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), measured on MODIS and Sentinel-2 imagery and published under CC BY 4.0. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Public Domain). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ slightly from each country’s official figure.